Teachers in Childress, Shamrock armed and ready for a new year

As far as allowing school personnel to carry firearms, Shamrock ISD is not exactly unique. Other schools in Texas have adopted similar policies, and smaller school districts (Shamrock ISD has an enrollment of about 430 students from pre-kindergarten through high school) do not have the financial resources to employ full-time security personnel, such as school liaison officers.

The Childress and Shamrock independent school districts are a year into defender programs that allow staff members to bring firearms to schools, a move administrators hope gives students, parents and teachers peace of mind.

“We’re not here to take a life,” Childress Superintendent Rick Teran said. “We’re here to protect children. Whether we’re safer or not, that’s up to each individual. But I think we’re a little more prepared.”

School starts later this month for students in both districts.

The 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., left 20 children dead and spurred school districts across the region to consider whether their campuses were truly safe. Schools have added surveillance cameras, secured entries and liaison officers, while some have gone a step further.

Last year, Shamrock ISD’s board approved a measure that allows school personnel to carry firearms on campus. The school district also received media attention when it posted signs that stated its staff is armed.

“Our thinking was to let people know that we would take care of our kids and hopefully deter any of those actions,” Shamrock High School Principal Kenneth Shields said.

Under Shamrock’s program, an undisclosed number of board-approved staff members carry a firearm on their person, and each classroom has a safe that holds a “protection device,” Shields said. Staff in the program must have a concealed handgun license, he said.

Childress ISD’s board approved a similar measure last year that allows certain school employees to access firearms kept in safes, Teran said. The school district devoted $150,000 to the purchase of firearms, safes, practice ammunition, a panic system and training, he said.

“With all the issues in the nation now, with gunmen coming into our schools and attacking our children, we felt it was our next step for our community,” Teran said.

If a staff member opens one of the safes, an alert system would notify local law enforcement, Teran said, and the school district would go into lockdown.

When the Shamrock ISD board of education held a meeting last year to gauge public support of arming staff, substitute teacher Beth Fullbright had expressed concerns that other security issues also should be addressed, according to the meeting’s minutes.

Fullbright supports Shamrock ISD’s decision to arm some employees, but she points to building access as an issue. Shamrock ISD doesn’t have a buzz-in system that has become commonplace at schools in recent years.

“I do not have children who go to school at Shamrock, but that’s my issue,” she said.

“You don’t have a way of identifying who is coming in your building.”

Bushland ISD’s board has discussed allowing trained staff to carry concealed handguns, but the school district has not pursued taking up the measure.

“We’re looking at every avenue and every alternative that’s out there before we decide to move that direction,” Superintendent Don Wood said.

Childress and Shamrock’s programs include several training seminars, including a three-day session that included a simulated active-shooter situation, Teran said.

Childress police also have participated in active-shooter training in the elementary school, he said.

Childress ISD has completed other safety efforts, including hiring a liaison officer and installing a panic system that gives teachers access to hidden buttons in classrooms to alert law enforcement of a security issue, Teran said. The school district is also adding $150,000 in surveillance cameras, he said.

“I don’t know if you ever actually feel safer, but you know you have a response team that can help you in the case of an emergency,” Teran said.